What is wrong with capitalism?

[McGyver]

This is not so much a problem with capitalism but a problem with a lack of democracy. Social and economic democracy can be achieved in a political system that respects private property and encourages entrepreneurial drive and the creation and accumulation of private wealth. Indeed it cannot be achieved otherwise. But it requires a strong public sector that will ensure that private avarice ultimately works in the public interest. It requires a recognition that for capitalism to work, the economy must serve the people (Adam Smith would say the markets) and not the other way around.
AM

Very well stated. The role of the public sector, and democracy, can also be summed as "The Invisable Hand." And without it, a democratic system will fall prey to tyrany, a breakdown in social order, and chaos. It is with these regards - that "Free Speech" becomes so critical in maintaining the democratic system of checks and balances - and intervention when necessary.

Mac

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

I don't see why not, we have it. You're assuming any extra terrestrial life with be more socially advanced than us. That's not necessarily true.

Ever read anything by Michio Kaku? He contends that any advanced civilization capable of interstellar travel would have to develope sociologically far beyond where we are today in order to make that accomplishment. I would have to agree with you though that I don't quite see it as necessary but it would probably make it far more likely.

 

[flotsam]

Ever read anything by Michio Kaku? He contends that any advanced civilization capable of interstellar travel would have to develope sociologically far beyond where we are today in order to make that accomplishment. I would have to agree with you though that I don't quite see it as necessary but it would probably make it far more likely.

I think it is of almost universal agreement, that the future history of the human race (should it survive) will undoutably involve technological proggress and improvement in our understanding of the laws of nature as it always has.
Given this, why would social/political systems be left out.

Scientific theories will continue to give way to better ones. Medicines will continue to be replaced with better medicines. Machines will continue to be changed for better machines. Regressive political systems will give way to more proggressive ones. This is the fate of intelligent beings capable of these things and bound by evolution forever.

In my view evolution is a universal theory in every sense of the word. Not only does it apply to the whole universe but it also shapes and directs the actions and behaviour of every creature in more asspects and detail than that is initially obvious. Everything we do is essentially bound by its law.

In the future capitalism will be thought of by mankind as a primitive system that had its time and its purpose. Like the way we think of fudalism today. Capitalism has been an essential stepping-stone. But that is all any system is when viewed in history, a stepping-stone to the next one.

Capitalism will not be around forever, but change is a constant. Not even the hills endure. Not even the Earth will last. The next great human era will be the 'social epoch', viewed by humans a thousand years from now as great leap forward. Remember, modern socialism has/could only ever grow in stature due to the social conditions of capitalism. Socialism is a social/collective force and capitalism brought us together in cities and factories where the ideas spread. My visions of an advanced human civilisation do not include capitalism anymore than they do the spinning jenny.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

I think it is of almost universal agreement, that the future history of the human race (should it survive) will undoutably involve technological proggress and improvement in our understanding of the laws of nature as it always has.
Given this, why would social/political systems be left out.
Scientific theories will continue to give way to better ones. Medicines will continue to be replaced with better medicines. Machines will continue to be changed for better machines. Regressive political systems will give way to more proggressive ones. This is the fate of intelligent beings capable of these things and bound by evolution forever.
In my view evolution is a universal theory in every sense of the word. Not only does it apply to the whole universe but it also shapes and directs the actions and behaviour of every creature in more asspects and detail than that is initially obvious. Everything we do is essentially bound by its law.
In the future capitalism will be thought of by mankind as a primitive system that had its time and its purpose. Like the way we think of fudalism today. Capitalism has been an essential stepping-stone. But that is all any system is when viewed in history, a stepping-stone to the next one.
Capitalism will not be around forever, but change is a constant. Not even the hills endure. Not even the Earth will last. The next great human era will be the 'social epoch', viewed by humans a thousand years from now as great leap forward. Remember, modern socialism has/could only ever grow in stature due to the social conditions of capitalism. Socialism is a social/collective force and capitalism brought us together in cities and factories where the ideas spread. My visions of an advanced human civilisation do not include capitalism anymore than they do the spinning jenny.

Evolution is an adaptation to environmental circumstances. It does not mean that things will always get better and better. If the environmental circumstances favour it the world could easily go back to societies predominantly run by dictators with a more classic version of corporatism. Depending on circumstances the exploitation of workers and resources may be the only viable way in which to get off the planet.

 

[X-43D]

True. Genetic evolution does not necessarily mean that human intelligence will increase.

 

[Astronuc]

Well Capitalism seems to be working at Goldman-Sachs.

Goldman Sachs is expected to pay $11 billion in bonuses this year. According to New York Magazine, that's $1.65 billion for the firm's 250 partner managing directors to split among themselves. With all senior managers of Goldman taking home a $600,000 salary, an equal split of 30 percent of $1.65 billion would be worth almost $2 million, pushing their pay into the neighborhood of $2.6 million. The remaining $1.15 billion is then split among the partners according to the discretion of the top dogs, who evaluate each partner. For those in the highest standing, the estimated numbers run in the neighborhood of $20 million to $40 million.

http://www.nymag.com/nymetro/news/bizfinance/biz/features/15197/

 

[Zlex]

The problem with Capitalism is that it is undemocratic. The entire idea of property ownership is. If a person is said to own something then, no matter if it is against the will of the general populace of against the will of the people it concerns, the state will enforce the owners will on all decisions to do with what he "owns".

And you think that is a problem?

Here is your life, and here is my life. Here are the reasons why you shoud abdicate some/any control over your life to be disposed of as I see fit. 'Voluntarily' has nothing at all to do with the concept of polite politics, because you/I don't even have to convince each other, 'politically;' you/I only need to convince enough of some mob.

So, not that you have, but let's not for one second pretend that basing principles on 'some type of politics' is in any significant way superior to basing principles on 'some type of violence,' because the force of numbers itself, ie, the violence that politics is in pursuit of, is not in itself either superior nor more likely to serve as a basis for 'principles' then any other form of mere violence.

America/Western Society is the first glimpse at an experiment trying to undercut the rules of mere politics/violence of numbers as a means to control the skins of others; a meager stab, if imperfect, at establishing the foundation 'principles' which restrict, define, guide, and limit anyone of us before we set out with our petty political arguments to control the skin of others. We would like to think that freedom in America means, anything goes, as long as we convoince enough of the mob to go along with it. Well, not yet, and not as long as we remain a constitutionally limited democratic republic, and not merely a tribe/mob.


It is the brute power of Marx's eminent domain that allows the tribe to do what it will, not any moral code. It is the ultimate might makes right; the ultimate will of the Jungle's Strong--the mob/tribe-- over the Jungle's Weak--any one of us.

It is only with the advent of modern civilization that attempts have been made to place reasonable limits on that always irresistable brute force. America and its constitutionally limited democratic republic is one of the latest, modern experiments pulling man from the jungle and declaring that in this tribe, we join together to defend the concept that the power of the tribe, although great, is not absolute. An idea very unlike the totalitarian extremes of scientific statism that have lurched across the rest of the world in the last century.

An idea so great that, it has left a long trail of individuals willing to sacrifice all to defend a tribe dedicated to that idea, so that it might exist somewhere on Earth. When you examine the true meaning of freedom, you find that it means freedom from the absolute dominance of the Jungle's tribe.

 

[Astronuc]

$430 a Square Foot, for Air? Only in New York Real Estate

How about that?

(Nov. 30) - The price of air has gone up in Manhattan.

It's now $430 a square foot.

Two New York City developers have agreed to pay a record-setting amount for "air rights" so they can build a 35-story apartment tower with views of Central Park from the high floors.

The brothers William L. and Arthur W. Zeckendorf are set to pay $430 per square foot - more than twice the going rate - for unused air rights over Christ Church and the Grolier Club at Park Avenue and East 60th Street. Christ Church will collect more than $30 million; Grolier will get about $7 million.

Air rights allow developers to build taller by buying the space over low-scale buildings and transferring it (on paper, if not in reality) to spaces over adjacent buildings. Although such transfers occur elsewhere in the country, the prices do not run as high as they do in Manhattan, which, after all, is an island and generally provides developers with one option: up.

NYTimes

 

[Astronuc]

In 1974, Professor Muhammad Yunus, a Bangladeshi economist from Chittagong University, led his students on a field trip to a poor village. They interviewed a woman who made bamboo stools, and learned that she had to borrow the equivalent of £15 to buy raw bamboo for each stool made. After repaying the middleman, sometimes at rates as high as 10 percent a week, she was left with a penny profit margin. Had she been able to borrow at more advantageous rates, she would have been able to amass an economic cushion and raise herself above subsistence level.

Realizing that there must be something terribly wrong with the economics he was teaching, Yunus took matters into his own hands, and from his own pocket lent the equivalent of £17 to 42 basket-weavers. He found that it was possible with this tiny amount not only to help them survive, but also to create the spark of personal initiative and enterprise necessary to pull themselves out of poverty.

http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/headlines/2004globalconf_yunus_speech.shtml

Thanks to cyrusabdollahi for this little gem.